Mindfulness Creates a Memorable Customer Experience; 6 Steps to Success

I just got off the phone with Mitzi of REI, the outdoor gear and clothing retailer. If I didn’t know better, I would have guessed I was the only person she had talked to that day.

She sounded present, engaged, interested, and very human.

There was no bored, robotic voice.

There was no dull, asking a question you had already answered.

There were no requests for information delivered in a bossy, give-the-customer-a-direct-order way.

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Since I consult in, and teach, customer service, I’m always interested in what people focus on and do inside their head in order to give great service, so I asked her.

"I try to be really mindful in my interactions," she said. "In fact the other day I told my supervisor that whenever someone calls, I imagine they are my first customer of the day."

She also noted another thing that made it easy to bring a positive emotional state and present frame of mind to each call.

"Working for a great company like REI makes it easy to give great service because callers have such a positive feeling about the company, they’re usually already happy when they call."

So What Are the Take Away Messages Here?

1. If you want your customer service team to deliver a customer experience that makes the customer feel special and in good hands, teach them to practice their mindfulness. These practice opportunities help them be more present, engaging, and empathic with your customers.
   
   

2. Because customer service is such an emotionally demanding job—especially call center customer service—and because the quality of your service depends on the emotional state of your people, invest in their stress management and emotional self-management skill development. You will reap huge rewards. It will not only reduce turnover and absenteeism but will also improve the quality of the customer service they’re able to deliver day in and day out. The less stressed they are, the more energetic and happy they will come across to your customers.
   
   

3. Find out what you as a manager and you as an employer can do to make it easier for them to do their jobs well. Find out what obstacles you can remove that would reduce frustration. Find out what you can do to help them feel "the thrill of victory" that comes from excelling at their job…rather than the "agony of defeat" that comes from knowing you’re doing a mediocre job, but not having the skills, support, or processes to remedy that.
   
   

4. Related to Point #3, invest in skill development around making a great first impression and handling difficult customers. I’ve found over the years in my work with customer service professionals that much of the stress they feel in their work, they inadvertently create by mishandling those two Moments of Truth. The more skilled they are at starting the interaction off well and at dealing with upset customers, the less stress they experience and the more pride and "thrill of victory" they will experience in their work.
   
   

5. Examine your customer service processes and policies to see how customer-friendly they are. The more customer-friendly they are, the more likely your callers will either be in a good mood, or…if something went wrong…willing to give your business and your customer service reps the benefit of the doubt.
   
   

6. Celebrate and learn from your exemplars. This is something I used to do when I managed a training department at a call center. I would "Y Cord" with a rep and take notes. I would listen for exceptionally gracious and skilled way of phrasing something or some other example of excellence. I would then write up my findings, including my verbatim transcript, and send it to the supervisors to share with their teams. Doing this doesn’t just provide very useful skill-building information to your team, it also shows your customer service team that you notice and appreciate excellence.
   

These are six things you can do to help your customer service representatives cultivate and maintain a mental and emotional state. Doing so makes it possible for them to deliver a positive, personal, present—and therefore memorable—customer experience. This will not only benefit your customers and your business; it also will make your customer service representatives’ jobs more emotionally satisfying. This in turn will help them stay fresh and alive…and bring that aliveness to every caller.

David Lee, the founder of HumanNature@Work, works with employers who want to improve employee engagement, customer service, and morale. He has worked with organizations and presented at conferences both domestically and abroad.